Hello everyone! Thanks so much for supporting my efforts with this story and for waiting for the next chapter. It's been challenging to write the past few weeks because I've been swamped with work but I'll try my best to get the next one out faster.
Thanks for the support!
I don't own Harry Potter
Chapter 4: Blood Ties
Hogwarts, Scotland September 1938
Ivy's hands shook as she placed them in her lap. Tom isn't in the same House as me. She thought, bewildered. She had listened with all her might on the train, attempting to discern what the boy (was his name Marcus?) meant by being 'sorted' into different Houses.
It appeared that it mean that Tom and Ivy would be separated and they would both have to spend the majority of their time with strangers. For how long, it wasn't clear. But Ivy didn't like it. Things like that made her uncomfortable. Ivy tried to focus on what was going on in front of her, but large amounts of people made her nervous. Large amounts of people she didn't know was worse.
She was startled out of her thoughts by a light touch on her shoulder. She turned towards it to meet the eyes of another girl, about her age.
"Hello, I'm Susan Woodson. I saw you on the train in the compartment with two boys? Looks like we were both placed into Ravenclaw." The girl had nice blue eyes and she dimpled one the left side of her mouth when she smiled.
Ivy introduced herself but was immediately on guard. In her experience it was the pretty girls who ended up being the cruelest ones. She made sure to keep the conversation nice and light, laughing politely at some points, nodding appropriately at others.
Yes, it was always better to know as much about other people as you could without revealing as much about herself. Tom had taught her that. He had also told her that other people usually wanted to talk about themselves and their opinions more than anything. Both had been accurate points as far as she could tell.
The rest of dinner went smoothly and she began to force herself to relax. Ivy was introduced to several other members of Ravenclaw house, each nicer than the last. It was a bit too much for Ivy; she was starting to become suspicious. How could so many people be so seemingly happy? There had to be a catch and she would find out what it was before it caught her.
The Headmaster (Dippet?) stood up after everyone had finished eating and offered a few words including announcements regarding classes and rules. He seemed to be the type of old man that knew a great deal but only shared what he felt necessary for others to know. Short and to the point, Ivy thought.
Ivy wasn't sure about him yet, she would need to gather more information. She had done her best to observe what she could of the first man who had come to see her and Tom, Professor Dumbledore. Tom and she had both agreed that he wasn't someone to be trusted, but one to be watched.
Instead they had agreed to be on their best behavior while at the school…at least until they could learn the best way to cover their tracks. Ivy had always made a point to do that with authority figures, for example, the head matron and other staff at the orphanage. If you could get on those people's good sides it usually made life easier and they in turn would be less suspicious of you.
Headmaster Dippet finished his announcements and they were all dismissed. An older student further down the Ravenclaw table with a silver badge pinned on his shirt beckoned all the first-year students to follow him. Ivy glanced towards the Slytherin table and saw Tom was pausing to meet her eyes. He nodded to her and mouthed 'tomorrow', before following his own silver-badged student down a side corridor.
Ivy instantly relaxed. It wasn't that she couldn't do things without Tom, it was just, well, she had never wanted to. Ever since that time in the cave, several years ago, and again when she was being teased by others at the orphanage, she had felt like she had found the missing piece to her life. Another person, like her, with strange powers that had no explanation, she had felt an almost instant connection. Almost like a security blanket, Tom was always around. Ivy liked it that way.
She turned and followed the rest of the students up a flight of stairs and promptly forgot her train of thought as she took in the rest of the castle. Flights upon flights of stairs, rows upon rows of portraits (and they moved!). Ivy found she was staring rather rudely around the entire way to their destination. She was so overwhelmed by the sights that she nearly forgot the path they had taken.
The herd of students continued up and up until they appeared to be at the entrance to one of the highest towers in the castle. Ivy peered out a window and saw the light-reflected lake many feet below. She turned her attention back towards the front when the silver-badged boy spoke.
"First-years this is the entrance to Ravenclaw Tower. Inside you will find your common room and your dormitories. Each year has their own dorm, further separated into boys and girls. Once you find your room you must locate your bed. You fill find that your belongings from the train have already been brought up. Now, please observe how to enter the dormitory."
The boy turned his back on the crowd of first-years to face something that Ivy couldn't quite see. She jiggled around her classmates, having a harder time than most due to her smaller size. She finally wedged herself in-between two people and was just in time to hear a disembodied voice.
"Take away the whole and some still remains. What is it?"
"The word 'wholesome'." The boy said promptly.
"Very good." The voice said again.
The boy continued through the door and beckoned the rest of the group to follow.
As Ivy passed through the door she examined it and saw no handle or key-hole, only a bronze door-knocker in the shape of an eagle. She frowned in confusion, but continued forward.
"As some of you may have seen, the bronze eagle that graces our dormitory door is the emblem of our house. As our main characteristic is wisdom, all you need do to enter our common room is answer a riddle correctly. The other Houses' dorms offer passwords which are usually changed on a weekly basis. Ravenclaw alone has the honor of our riddles." The boy had a smug look about that.
"Before I forget, my name is Theodore Hensley and I am a fifth year student and currently a prefect of Ravenclaw. Please come to me or our other house prefects," he nodded to a several other students who had also guided the short tour, "if you have any questions. Now, make sure you get a good night's rest, we all have classes in the morning."
Theodore dismissed them, but not before his gaze seemed to linger a little longer on Ivy than she thought was usual. For a moment, the crowd of first-years seemed to mill around aimlessly for a moment, but the gradually dispersed, each going off in pairs or threes to look for their rooms.
"Um, want to see what our room looks like?" Said a tentative voice.
Ivy turned around to see the blue eyes of Susan, the girl Ivy had sat next to at dinner.
"You mean, we all share a room?" Ivy asked nervously. She had done so at the orphanage, but many times she had chosen to either sleep in Tom's room or some other area before the matrons had given up and given her a room to herself.
"Yes, didn't you know?" And she walked away a few steps up a staircase to the right, looking behind her once to see if Ivy was following her.
She followed Susan up the staircase (how many floors did this castle have anyway?) and they followed the corridor passing several rooms. Ivy could read the plaque on one of the doors that said 'Second Years' and another that said 'Third Years'. Finally, the last door's plaque read, 'First Years' and the two of them entered.
Ivy's first impression of the room was that it was the nicest space she had ever seen. The walls, ceiling and floor were covered with various shades of blue. The beds in the dorm were constructed out of brass which gave the entire room a cheery glow. There were large fireplaces on each side of the room, three beds or six total on the left and right. Ivy's bed looked warm and inviting. She found her truck and meager possessions in good order. No sooner had she sat down on the mattress that she felt her eyes droop. And it was no wonder. The day had been so full of new experiences, fears, and excitement, that Ivy was exhausted.
"Do you want to go to bed now?" Susan asked kindly, and then stretched her arms high above her head. "Me too."
Ivy could only nod and she stumbled into her pajamas and went right to sleep.
Tom found that he couldn't sleep. His brain just wouldn't shut off. There was so much to think about, so much to wonder about, so much to theorize about. Sullenly he found himself wishing that Ivy were lying next to him…he would never tell her that her presence always allowed him to sleep soundly and tonight he missed it. Instead he grumbled to himself and directed his thoughts to reviewing the events of the last few hours including what had occurred once he had entered his new dormitory for the first time.
Before he had left the Great Hall with the rest of his year-mates he had been sure to throw Ivy a little signal. No need for them to attract attention to themselves at this interval. They would talk the next day. Satisfied that she would be taken care of, he had faced forward and traipsed down several flights of stairs.
His trip down to the Slytherin common-room from the Great Hall had been uneventful. It seemed that the room was located in one of the dungeons in the basement of the castle. It was the deepest and perhaps oldest part of Hogwarts.
They had continued down a long corridor which Tom couldn't help but notice was rather damp in some areas. He wrinkled his nose in distaste but stopped when a boy next to him had said,
"Father told me that the common room is special. It's located under the lake, you know, the one we just sailed across before dinner? Anyway, he said that there is supposed to be a hidden passage, one only Salazar Slytherin himself knew about, that leads outside onto the grounds from our very common room? How superb is that?"
The speaker had been the blonde boy that Tom had noticed being sorted into Slytherin when he was trying to figure out the whole 'different Houses' business. Tom had continued to listen to the boy prattle away about the uniqueness of their new home, while only believing about half of it, when they came to an abrupt stop.
"Alright new-bloods, listen up." The new speaker had appeared to be the boy with the silver badge that had ushered them all forward as soon as dinner ended. Tom had leaned closer and read that his badge said 'prefect'.
"This is the entrance to our common-room," the boy had continued and gestured towards the wall in front of them, which Tom couldn't help but notice was completely blank, "you enter with a password which is not to be shared with anyone outside of our House. The password this week is Parselmouth."
As soon as the boy had uttered the word, the wall had changed to reveal an entrance that had simply not been there before. Tom found that he had smiled slightly. The more he saw of magic, the more he wanted to know everything he could about it. He wanted to explore it, wield it…even own it, if he could. He had stepped forward with the rest of the crowed of awed first-years.
He had looked around the common room and his eyes had been met with a great deal of stone and green. As he had continued his observations, he had seen that each corner, piece of furniture and light fixture had some kind of serpent intertwined into it.
Tom had narrowed his eyes as his brain clicked several things into place. When Dumbledore had come to visit him and Ivy, Tom had mentioned his skills of speaking to snakes. Now, at Hogwarts, Tom had been sorted into, for lack of a better term, the 'snake house'. He felt like there had to be some kind of connection he just wasn't seeing. Something that sang to him, deep in his blood about the entire place, as if in the entire world, he belonged no-where else but in that very room.
As he had pondered this, the Slytherin prefect was busy explaining various rules and expectations related to the common area. Finally, the older student had stopped pontificating and gestured for the students to find their way to their dorm room. Tom hadn't shared a living space with another child for several years, ever since the matrons had…caught on to specific incidents. Not to mention the other orphans had been too scared to set foot in the same room as him without another adult. In fact besides Ivy, Tom had slept alone for the better part of the last three years.
After arriving in his new dorm room which had been smartly marked on the outside door with a silver plaque designating the first year dorms, he had found that he had been pleased by the overall look and feel of the area.
"So, what's your name?"
Tom had narrowed his eyes slightly, annoyed to be distracted by his train of thought and turned to look at the boy who had spoken. The words had been boldly orated by the blonde boy who had been talking outside in the corridor.
"Tom Riddle. What's yours?" He had arched his dark eyebrows subtly as a way to challenge him.
"Abraxus Malfoy. This is Regus Lestrange, Thoros Nott, Alphard Black and Jaxus Avery." He had nodded to all the rest of the boys in the room, seemingly knowing them all by name like they were old friends or something. And perhaps, Tom mused, they all were.
Tom had noted that Malfoy had said the names this like he was stating titles, like Tom should know who they are.
"Pleased to meet you." Tom had said as he had eyed each one of the boys in turn. He had wanted to size up each of them. To figure out how he could use them to his own ends.
"Same. Riddle, you said? Don't think I've heard of that name before…who're your parents?" Malfoy had continued.
Tom had stiffened ever so slightly and had found he needed to hide the fact that the question had made him highly irritated. He had found it much too rude and direct given that he had known these boys for only a few minutes. But he hadn't allowed it to show. Clearly there was something else or greater importance going on that he was unaware of given he hadn't been raised by wizards. Instead, he decided to play for the sympathy card. Better these ones underestimate him until he could find out just what was going on.
"…I don't know, I grew up in an orphanage. My father died before I was born and my mother lived just long enough to name me." He had said this softly, craftily drawing his eyebrows together into a pained expression, something that was effective, though also a complete fabrication.
It worked.
Malfoy visibly deflated from his air of bravado. "Ah…I see…I'm sorry to hear that. Well, seeing as you are in Slytherin you must be from a pure-blood family. We of course are all members of the sacred twenty-eight."
Tom had done his best not to appear blank at that statement.
It had been Malfoy's turn to raise an eyebrow at Tom's lack of response, but he then had brushed away his surprise and explained. He had explained the hierarchy of the wizarding world. He had started with Muggles on the bottom, described Muggle-borns as the next rung, Mud-Bloods after (Tom didn't press him by asking for a definition of that word) and finally pure-bloods at the top.
At that point Nott had stepped forward and explained with a great deal of pride that his father, Cantankerus Nott, had over the last few years successfully completed research that pointed to twenty-eight wizarding families who fit the class of 'pure-blood'.
The boys had continued to talk well into the rest of the evening before finally falling asleep after a warning from the prefect. The conversation had been so very interesting for Tom…he had found that he needed to know more about the so-called wizarding hierarchy.
Long after the other boys had slowed their breathing, Tom had found he couldn't stand to even close one eye. He had found instead that the more he learned about the wizarding world and magic, the more he found he knew less and less about himself.
Who were his parents?
Why did they die and leave him alone if they had magic at their disposal?
Finally only able to get to sleep somewhere in the small hours of the morning Tom had come up with a plan: his first order of business would be to find out his lineage and consequently, just where he fit in the magical world-ladder.
His last coherent thought was that he had to tell Ivy about this as soon as he could.
Hogwarts, Scotland, Present day
"She's in Ravenclaw!" Hermione's voice, shrill from excitement, cut through the early morning air of the Great Hall.
"Ow…who's in where now?" Ron asked as he paused in mid eye-rub to look at her.
"Ivy Petros! You were right Ron; she was sorted into another House."
"…are you sure Hermione? It doesn't strike me as normal for Voldemort to hang around with someone other than his future Death Eaters." Harry managed through a mouth-full of buttered toast.
"I'm sure and here's proof." She slammed down a heavily bound book that read 'Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry Prefect and Head Student Records'. It seemed the book held records of every student who ever assumed those roles as far back as the last thousand years. Hermione had the list open and tabbed to several years in the 1940's.
Harry looked closer and blinked a few times.
Under the list of Prefects for 1942:
Slytherin: Tom Riddle, Olive Hornby
Hufflepuff: Marcus Burbage, Jewel Tenor
Gryffindor: John Weasley, Margret Abbott
Ravenclaw: Loe Nix, Ivy Petros
Then again for the list of Head Boy and Head Girl in 1944:
Tom Riddle and Ivy Petros
Behind him Ron whistled. "Who would have thought that You-Know-Who was a model student?"
"Who would have thought that his closest supporter was a girl from Ravenclaw?" Harry countered. "Hermione, do you think you could find out anything else about that girl?"
Hogwarts, Scotland, October 1938
The first month of classes and Tom's new life passed by in a blur of magical theory, application and a steep learning curve. He found that while he and Ivy were ahead of most of their peers in actual magical application and spell-casting, they still lacked quite a bit of knowledge about the magical world itself.
Tom did what he could to minimize his mistakes regarding this lack of knowledge. He had no wish to draw attention to himself in that aspect. Ivy, if possible, had it even worse. It seemed that while she excelled academically, she failed socially though Tom reflected that it wasn't much of a surprise given her temperament and personality. However, what made it especially hard was that there wasn't a lot of time for the two to spend together.
They shared a few classes and managed to eat lunch and dinner with one another at least a few times a week, but Tom had to admit that the way things were segregated between houses annoyed him. But only when it came to Ivy. He found that the less time he had with her, the more irritable be became.
Ivy for her part seemed to sense this and did her best to check in with him discreetly at least a few times a day. That seemed to slightly quell his feelings…again none of this was verbalized.
With Ivy, Tom had never had to explain. She just understood.
Unlike some other students he could mention.
Those other students in question, Malfoy and company, seemed to flock around him like little ducklings. It had started once they could see how gifted he was, not that Tom was shocked. It felt right to have others finally acknowledge his talents. It felt good to have teachers be pleasantly surprised at first, then obviously enjoy giving him harder and harder spells to perform.
Finally, the first grade reports came back right before Halloween and the top two slots were given to Tom with Ivy a close second; the two were no more than a point apart.
Tom took a moment after those results to flash one of his true smiles. The one that he knew not to let others see. The one he could only let one person see.
And she smiled back.
